community service

Rhinelander FBLA/DECA prides itself on the interaction and dedication to the community we live in. Each year, we are congratulated on our service projects and their affect on our local community which gives us all the more reason to push ourselves further in our physical connection and impact on the world we live in. ﻿

Trick-Or-Can

Trick or Can is a statewide DECA initiative that a few officers learned about at a DECA conference and decided to bring to our community in 2016. Planning for the event began in July and slowly developed into a door-to-door Food Drive collecting non-perishable food items directly from the community's doorsteps-- raising not only food items, but also awareness for a large issue in our community. In the first year, Rhinelander FBLA/DECA 's project is already rising into the upper levels of DECA chapters around the state who participate in this event. In the 2016-2017 school year, close to 30 FBLA/DECA members participated over a three hour pickup time where the drive collected a grand total of 820 food items for the local Rhinelander Food Pantry.​​

Ruby's Pantry

Each month, FBLA/DECA members have the opportunity to help out at a local food distribution called Ruby's Pantry hosted here in Rhinelander, WI. Distributing food to local and neighboring community members, the event reaches around 300 families a month and is a great partnership for our members to partake in. Reaching as many people as it does, the distribution requires lots of volunteers to both greet and direct people as well as box and load goods for those benefiting from the project. As a new event for our chapter starting over the 2016-2017 school year, we hope to continue our involvement with this incredible project for years to come. ​

Fall Fest

On October 15, 2016 FBLA/DECA had the opportunity to once again participate in Hanson’s Fall Fest in partnership with Rhinelander’s Hanson’s Garden Village. This year’s annual fall celebration had over 900 people in attendance, with our FBLA/DECA members as the main labor force for the exciting community gathering. The 30 FBLA/DECA members that participated were in charge of managing people and games throughout the day including: parking, pumpkin bowling, face painting, tractor rides, and other fun events for the community to enjoy. In total, we had over 175 hours of community service for the 6 hour day, and are looking forward to continuing work with Hanson’s Garden Village and the exciting fall gathering in the future.

Adopt-A-Highway

Highway cleanup is a wonderful opportunity for our members to give back to the community by making the city roads cleaner and looking nice; a simple project with a large impact. Our mile stretch of highway is located behind Shopko on the Hwy 17 bypass. Each year our members do a fall and spring cleaning along our adopted highway. Our last highway cleanup, on October 19, 2016 was very successful. Doing the project after our summer cookout, part of our officer team and several dedicated members were able to leave the highway looking much nicer than how we found it before the school year even began. We hope that our next cleanup will continue leaving a visible impact on our community with just as much, if not more, membership involvement! ​

Letters to Santa

In the 2016-17 school year, 62 of our 87 members participated in one of our favorite events: writing letters to Santa. Our members were able to interact with students from 10 elementary classrooms within the two schools that requested our visit: Pelican Elementary School and Crescent Elementary School. This event is one of our favorite activities for multiple reasons. It’s a wonderful way for Rhinelander students of all ages to come together and strengthen community bonds. It’s also the perfect opportunity to start exposing elementary students to FBLA/DECA, planting the seeds for strong future membership. And of course, the joy and Christmas cheer that this event creates for all those involved is truly priceless. “Santa” even managed to write and deliver a reply to every single letter that was written! We look forward to continuing to watch this event grow and flourish in the years to come.

Jeans for Teens and NATH Dinner

This holiday season, our Chapter decided to pursue a project we call "Jeans for Teens" in which our chapter collects used jeans to donate to the Frederick Place Community Homeless Shelter and Family Resource Connection. This year, with three sub committees made up of 10 of our dedicated members, we started the drive on December 16th and ended on January 6th. The team positioned collection bins at nine sites around town and after press releases, news/radio interviews, and in-school advertisement, concluded the drive with free admission with a donation to the Boy’s Varsity Basketball Game the Tuesday before the end of the drive. This was the third year of the drive for RHS FBLA/DECA and the chapter was ecstatic to end up with a total of 318 pairs of jeans donated from all over the community! The jeans were dropped off at the local Frederick Place Homeless Shelter as well as the Family Resource Connection so as to help our community members who may be in need.

Valentine's Day Boxes

Every year, our club organizes the Valentine’s Day Boxes event at several of Rhinelander’s elementary schools, in which the high school students aid the elementary students in designing a box to put their classmates’ Valentine’s Day cards in. In the 2016-17 school year, we visited 12 different classrooms within Crescent Elementary and Pelican Elementary, which allowed 55 of our 87 members to participate. This was an excellent way for us to create strong bonds with the students, and allowed our members to be positive role models for the younger students in our district. It also allowed for us to connect with the students and get them excited for our club before their start in high school.

Miracle Minutes

This 2016-2017 school year we hosted three Miracle Minutes to raise money for our national FBLA and DECA Charities: March of Dimes and MDA. The events were held at a Boys Wrestling Meet, Boys Basketball Game and Girls Basketball Game, raising over $822 in total. At these events, members run through the stands collecting spare change and bills from crowd members willing to donate. After explaining what their money was going towards, the crowd then had one minute to donate as much as possible. We were extremely happy with the outcome and the generosity of the Rhinelander and opposing team’s fans in just one minute! ​​

Penny Wars

Each year, FBLA/DECA hosts a penny war between Business Education teachers Mischell Fryar and Patrick Kubeny’s classes to raise funds for MDA (Muscular Dystrophy Association-- DECA’s national charity) and March of Dimes (FBLA’s national charity). The rules are simple: each class receives a jar in their teacher’s room, and throughout the week business students can put coins to add to their points (1 cent = 1 point), or dollars in other classes’ jars to subtract points ($1 = - 100 points). Between March 27 and March 31, 2017, ten classes joined together in this battle of financial exchange. After a frenzy of final additions that Friday, Mr. Kubeny’s 2nd hour won with a total of 7,378 points. Overall, the business department raised $445.63 for our FBLA and DECA national organizations in this one week collection. For more information about MDA and March of Dimes, go to www.mda.org and www.marchofdimes.org.

Food Drive

​​On January 19th, 2016 FBLA/DECA hosted a food drive at the Varsity Boys’ Basketball Game in the Jim Miazga Community Gymnasium. For every item that spectators donated, they received one dollar off the admission price. We received a grand total of 114 items and $36; all proceeds were given to the Rhinelander Food Pantry. Thanks to all who helped work and/or donated at this annual event!

For pictures from all of our projects, visit our Gallery!

Rhinelander FBLA/DECA Community Service Awards

State Community Service DECA 2017, Acts of KindnessState Community Service DECA 2017, Contributions to General Charity State Community Service DECA 2017, MDA Contributor State Community Service DECA 2017, 100 Hours State Community Service FBLA 2017, 1st PlaceRegional Community Service FBLA 2017, 1st Place﻿​﻿State Community Service DECA 2016, Acts of KindnessState Community Service DECA 2016, Contributions to General CharityState Community Service DECA 2016, MDA ContributorState Community Service DECA 2016, 100 HoursState Community Service FBLA 2016, 1st PlaceRegional Community Service FBLA 2016, 1st Place

​State Community Service DECA 2015, Acts of KindnessState Community Service DECA 2015, Contributions to General Charity​State Community Service DECA 2015, MDA ContributorState Community Service FBLA 2015, 1st PlaceRegional Community Service FBLA 2015, 1st Place​State Community Service FBLA 2014, 1st PlaceRegional Community Service FBLA 2014, 1st Place

"We make a living by what we get, But we make a life by what we give" ​~ Winston Churchill